I really hope the blur on the picture (https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Hubbard-Ima...) isn't hiding anything actually important because that can almost certainly be de-blurred with the right tooling.
NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
141–150 of 330 posts
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
> (I assume it is illegal in America, but how about Israel?) This part doesn't matter much in practicality. Like it is illegal for the US gov't to spy on their citizens. It is illegal for the UK to spy on their citizens. So the NSA made a deal with the UK. They spy on us, we spy on them, and exchange the info. There, the US didn't break the law and neither did the UK. They worked around it. We live in a shadowy world…
I'm not sure if this counts as spying but in UK they are allowed to monitor people to quite a large extent if I got this right. I think refusing to decrypt your device when requested is also punishable. https://www.theverge.com/2016/11/23/13718768/uk-surveillance...
Indeed, I don't think the UK government has any problem hacking phones if they believe this is required, but it's likely to involve disclosure to the courts, and hence in some way be accountable.
It's therefore easier to get a friendly government to do the hacking and to pass on the discovered info, which side-steps any legal accountability.
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#143Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can't. It's all marketing fluff at this point, because significant enough state actors will see the ~$10,000,000 R&D cost for a few iOS/Android zero-days as a drop in the bucket. We live in a post-security world, where it's economically feasible to develop malware at a pace that outruns Blue Teams. We live in a post-privacy world because Apple and Google happily pass your data back to world governments in the nam…
> We live in a post-privacy world because Apple and Google happily pass your data back to world governments in the name of stopping terrorism, or whatever the social cause du-jour is. To illustrate this point, Apple gives up users' data for about 150,000 users/accounts in the US[1] a year in response to government data requests. [1] https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/us.html
What can a company do when presented with a legal, legitimate warrant? We talk like Apple in this example has a choice to say “no”: they don’t, though.
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#144So how do we protect our privacy from the advance of technology? It doesn't seem possible. Just going after NSO is useless.
> So how do we protect our privacy from the advance of technology? It doesn't seem possible. Just going after NSO is useless. Like we do with anything else: These are crimes, but we are stuck in the mindset of the nascent Internet, when it was a growing experiment, a subculture in our society, harmless, and we wanted to nurture it and give it maximum freedom. Those days are long gone. The Internet is completely integ…
Why a new agency? This is already very much within the FBI’s jurisdiction. Why is the international surveillance of U.S. journalists and their sources not visibly a priority? In my opinion it’s a matter of policy. This comes from the top down.
Bringing justice to international actors opposing democratic ethics is regrettably less of a priority today than enforcing highly publicized and politicized criminal cases.
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
"And the US and England" When you are doing the information from the inside thing, you do need to get your players in line. England? I'm English ... and Welsh, Cornish, Scottish and tangentially Irish, not to mention German (check my username). The country is called Britain, the Great thing is only to distinguish from the other Britain - Brittany (part of France). You might as well call everyone from the USA as Texan…
> I'm English ... and Welsh, Cornish, Scottish and tangentially Irish, not to mention German (check my username). Sorry, but this is absolutely nonsensical to me, how can you be all these nationalities? Were you born on the most insane round trip flight ever or what? Edit: And sorry, as a Scot (One actually born there); 'the country' is not called 'Great Britain'. As a nationality we group identify as both $member-co…
We are called Great Britain because that is what James VI (I in England) called us when Scotland and England finally merged into Great Britain. He was our first joint King.
The other Britain is Brittany - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brittany. Have a look at the county names in Brittany and see if they look suspiciously like Devon and Cornwall.
My family/surname is Gerdes. In Scotland, that is rendered as Girders. Only you can pronounce it properly 8)
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#146Why aren't political exposed persons leaving iphones? It has been known for a while that it is not secure for them. An android tablet connecting to wifi hotspots only, or even lan only, with minimal software, and a dumb phone are more secure than iphone.
they need an actual functional phone. You can't be a journalist and not have a fully functional phone that access the internet whenever needed. I'm sure they use burners for sensitive stuff, but what are they supposed to use for their regular work, calls with the school, car navigation, ...
There are portable hotspots, you know....
I am assuming you use a killswitch VPN to your trusted network. NYT for this journalist.
My proposed setup is 3 devices: hotspot, android device without baseband, dumbphone. Hotspot would be the weak link here, security wise, but is easier and cheaper to replace. Nothing on dumbphone would be encrypted.
If I were a journalist, I would consider this alternative to being hacked. Remember he even knew there were at least attempts to hack his devices, years in advance.
They are just biting the "apple is the most secure alternative" propaganda.
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is not a correct analogy. There are multiple legitimate and moral usages of ammunition. A better comparison would be to ask if I would hire someone who worked for the East German Stasi, or someone who had helped to build the systems used to identify, target and kidnap dissidents in mainland China. Edit: Additionally, no, I would not hire an ammunition manufacturer who produced ammunition knowing that the entiret…
Good point, and the NSO example from OP is definitely extreme. But it rings alarm bells for me. It is year 2025 and there are distinct and two separate job markets. One cannot cross the line because your resume reflects your political choice. This kind of dystopia sucks and I am gonna push back as much as I can. OP's tone was definitely about activism and I can't stand behind it at all. Also ammunitions producers hav…
Once the rockets are up
Who cares where they come down?
That's not my department
Says Wernher Von BraunRe: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
> We live in a post-privacy world because Apple and Google happily pass your data back to world governments in the name of stopping terrorism, or whatever the social cause du-jour is. To illustrate this point, Apple gives up users' data for about 150,000 users/accounts in the US[1] a year in response to government data requests. [1] https://www.apple.com/legal/transparency/us.html
What can a company do when presented with a legal, legitimate warrant? We talk like Apple in this example has a choice to say “no”: they don’t, though.
Apple gives up customers' data when presented with simple data requests. Not all of the data they gave up was in response to subpeonas or warrants. Most tech companies have portals for law enforcement to simply ask, without a warrant, for users' data, and the companies often voluntarily share the requested data without any coercion from courts.
Yes, Apple is no different than any other tech company in that regard. The difference is that Apple's PR tells you otherwise. The whole San Bernardino shooting case had many people on HN saying that it meant that Apple would refuse to work with law enforcement when law enforcement would ask for users' data, even to the point of challenging subpeonas and warrants in court. That is clearly not the case.
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
My (properly) researched family tree is 15 generations deep for me personally, so far. My uncle has done quite a lot of research. Quite a lot. At the extreme 15 gens down, you get this in your Ahnentafel: "26921. Alice15 John (14829). Her married name was Trelowarth (14829). She was born circa 1550. She married Robert Trelowarth (14828) on 3 Oct 1574 at Wendron, Cornwall, UK. She died circa 1603 at Wendron, Cornwall,…
Oh, you're American? I'm pretty sure 15 generations ago I was probably Danish but that doesn't make me one of them... I kind of understand need to identify as someone more interesting though, I suppose. Perhaps you should just own who you are instead of pretending though my friend, maybe look into some meditation or such.. Edit: Apologies, I see you say you are British, however I've never met a British person who wou…
Piss off, I'm British.
Re: NYT journalist hacked with Pegasus after reporting on previous hacking attempts
#150I really hope the blur on the picture ( https://citizenlab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Hubbard-Ima... ) isn't hiding anything actually important because that can almost certainly be de-blurred with the right tooling.
Really? Seems blurred enough to me that even some sort of ML would spit out wrong characters.